Does anyone know any other ways to get rid of muscle cramps. Ive read magnesium and potassium can help. Topical cannibus and muscle relaxers for the pain. Does anyone know anything else that can help ease/prevent bad prolonged muscle cramps, especially in the legs?

An old runners tip is to lie with your feet elevated way up against a wall after a run. It helps the lactic acid that builds up on muscles and causes cramps to circulate through the blood steam as opposed to pooling in the legs. But that advice only helps if the reason for cramps is aerobic exercise. Back when I ran, I would suffer the worst leg cramps when taking time off from running, especially if the stop or start was abrupt. Then my mindset was that I had to keep running regularly to make the cramps stop. A friend, who ran more competitively than I ever did, used a massage stick on her legs.

My partner is a massage therapist, and after about ten years of work physical jobs my back was pretty fucked up. With a lot conjoling on his part and tears on mine he worked through a lot of the trouble.
Considering the pain I was in after all the treatments I bet a good massage every so often would be beneficial. (just make sure you sign up for a work massage, not a relaxing one).

I'll ask him when he wakes up, he'll have a better idea of what would help.

Massage worked for me, if it's chronic. Now I use a foam roller - actually on my lower back? IDK why that helps my legs. Definitely also potassium or magnesium. I think most people try potassium (eat bananas) but I always find I'm low on Mg instead and potassium never did much for mine. Both are used in the same biological process, I think usually it's an imbalance that causes problems? I could be wrong on that last part. Good luck.

What often works for me with leg cramps (after they've begun) is to put weight on that leg. Suffer through the pain for a few seconds and it clears up. Works especially well on cramps at the bottom of your foot!

Where there's smoke, there's fire. Just because you can't see it doesn't mean it doesn't exist. So just shut up, and bring some water.

I get cramps in my calves and arches at night when I don't keep up on taking my magnesium and/or potassium supplements. For me the sure-fire instant cure is to hobble downstairs and drink several tablespoons of dill pickle juice. It's gross, but when your foot won't uncurl, drinking a bit of pickle juice seems like a small price to pay. I've also heard sucking down a packet of yellow mustard (like what you get with a fast food meal) can do the trick, but that sounds even worse than pickle juice to me, so I've never tried it. I swear I'm not making this up. Something to do with your body needing some essential chemical something [technical explanation] ... and both dill pickles and yellow mustard have it.

Edited to add:
It just occurred to me that perhaps the hobbling itself is part (or all) of the cure. What if I've been drinking disgusting pickle juice all these years for no reason at all? Thanks a lot, forum. Thanks a lot.

Galen wrote:It just occurred to me that perhaps the hobbling itself is part (or all) of the cure. What if I've been drinking disgusting pickle juice all these years for no reason at all? Thanks a lot, forum. Thanks a lot.

Okay, finally spoke to my partner. He said, basically cramps are generally caused by three things. Your muscle can't work properly because of imbalance of magnesium & potassium, in which case you might have to fiddle around with those to get everything back how it should be. Your muscle isn't getting enough oxygen, in which case a general massage should increase blood flow to the area which will help. Or you might have a trigger point (most likely more than one really) in which case a massage can help release the trigger point which will help the whole area.

Like Rowan mentioned though, often it's not the direct area that has the issues. A leg problem can start at the hip/lower back so that's the area you'll need to work on first. A problem with your shoulder might be stemming from an issue in your feet. The body is a huge inter connected system so it's best to find a professional you trust and work with them to figure out the problem and try to fix it.

Afte chemotherapy my wife has had really bad leg cramps that wake her out of her sleep. Its not every week but when I wrote this she had one that lasted 3 hours and I literally woke up to her screaming.

Im going to have to try to incorperate better eating habits into her diet. Shes a picky eater and favors meats heavily.

I'll also try regular messages and be sure to include the lower back and also try to send her to see a professional.

@Nech
Scared to suggest powering through. If it doesnt go away it could diminish her stamina.

I'm not sure how it works in the states, but to become a massage therapist here you need a certain number of hours preforming massage so MT Schools will often have clinics where students provide massages for a much lower rate.
I know I just said find a professional you trust but if you've got a budget to stick to students can be more attentive because they're paying more attention to what they are doing.

And of course, being a massage therapist my partner is biased, he thinks most things can be fixed through regular massage lol

Are you talking about cramps like a charley horse? If so, I've only had them occasionally (they type that makes you wake up screaming in pain in the middle of the night), and mostly in my calves, but if I felt the cramp coming on, I could prevent it by extending the calf as much as I could, pressing the knee backwards and pointing my toes up towards my knees. It stopped the cramp every single time I caught it in time. Then I'd slowly release and if I felt the cramp coming back on I'd extend the calf for a while longer and wait. No more charley horse pains for me. I've also heard staying hydrated helps, but I have no idea if it's true or not.

"Winston Churchill once said 'The eyes are the windows of your face.' " -A man who's very scared of plants.